Restaurant commercial knives

[Jan]

Ok.....here we go....I have a question.
I have several restaurant accounts and I switch the knife sets out every 3 weeks......average 7 to 12 knives each........mostly white handled dexters, but some are Lasting Cut.....90% are chefs.
Often I have to buy new knives and local vendor sells the Lasting Cuts, so those are what I use.
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My question is:  when I take these out of plastic cover, they have small bevel......no polish.....groves........BUT THEY ARE RAZOR SHARP.......anyone like to comment on how they get them that sharp.?.?......slice maters in the air.
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I have never been able to duplicate that edge.
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The edge looks like 120/220 grit finish......

Max, first think I do with a new knife is measuring the edge angle. Sometimes I am able to measure also the secondary bevel angle. Having both angles is good for future edge duplication.

Because quality Catra instruments were too expensive for me I have made my own instrument which, for my purposes, works even better. The costs were circa $10 excluding children construction set used. My laser goniometer is on the attached pictures.

       

The red laser lines show that the included edge angle of a Mora knife with Scandi grid is circa 23° (2 x 11.5° side angle).

During guided sharpening (e.g. on Tormek) we are thickening the edge, so strictly speaking we can never exactly duplicate an existing edge. But in normal situations this occurs only after many sharpening or after massive steel removal.

I am attaching Victorinox recommendation dealing with this issue.

  servive-cut-grinding-sharpening-en-nov2012.pdf (Size: 168.24 KB / Downloads: 17)

Jan

P.S.:  The laser line is splited and reflected on the knife edge. The reflected rays draw two lines on the cross board which is calibrated in degrees.